In continuation with the ideas discussed in Jeffrey’s recent post “Toward the Singing of Propers”, here are two experimental samples of what such a simple parish resource for English propers might possibly look like. You can even sing them in Mass this weekend if you’d like!
The first sample is an engraving of the Introit, Offertory and Communion antiphons of the Graduale Romanum in English translation, set to simple Gregorian psalm tones. There are many reasons why a collection of propers using the Gregorian psalm tones would be an attractive solution, almost the “no-brainer” answer to the need for a simple parish resource for propers. After all, the Rossini propers, which were the Latin antiphons set to Gregorian tones, were very popular before the council, and the “Anglican Use Gradual” also uses a psalm tone approach and it is a very useful resource for many. Still, there are very real problems that are encountered in setting English texts to Gregorian psalm tones. The word accent and cadence patterns are very different in English than they are in Latin, for which the tones were composed, and 5 different people who set an English tone are likely to arrive at 5 different settings because of the challenges involved. Still this might be a reasonable solution to the problem of the average parish. Download it here.
The second sample is a similar yet different approach to solving the problem. In this case the same introit text is set in the first place using a melodic formula that is taken from the Gregorian modal and melodic vocabulary, yet is a sort of “hybrid” of a psalm tone (making great use of reciting pitches) and a through composed antiphon (with intonations, terminations and an overall melodic structure that is similar to these). The result is a melodic formula that is is a bit more sophisticated than a psalm tone, yet it is a formula that could be applied to virtually any English text (the formula in this example was composed as by Adam Bartlett and Fr. Columba Kelly, OSB). The main benefit to this approach for the beginning parish is that in learning a small set of melodies they will be able to sing a variety of, even all of the proper antiphons. A set of 8, 16, or even 24 of these melodic formulas could reflect the modality of the Gregorian propers, maintain a level of musical interest, retain simplicity, and could be used over and over again to make their use very simple for singers who are just beginning to sing the propers. Potential downfalls to this approach might be a perceived lack of “authenticity”, or a sense artificiality. Things to keep in mind are that the intention of the approach is to make the singing of propers as simple as possible for amateur parish singers. Download it here.
When we are talking about adapting the musical language of Gregorian chant to the English language there is always something that is going to be lost, and there is a hierarchy of values to be considered and taken into account. There is great opportunity, as we have recently heard from Msgr. Wadsworth, that there is a great opportunity for setting proper texts in a variety of styles. It remains to be seen as to which approach to the singing of the propers will be best for the aspiring parish. I think that there is absolutely an element of genius in the style of Gregorian chant that makes the weekly routine of singing new texts as smooth a process as possible, but I could be wrong. There are certainly many possibilities.
If you would like to participate in an An Experiment in Sacred Music Resource Production that explores these issues and is working toward solving the problem please visit the CMAA forum thread and get involved!
After having downloaded and printed several articles on reading neumes and four line staves, it was a pleasure to be able to sing this example accurately right from my computer screen! Thank you for posting this example. I'm sure that many readers of this blog will come to appreciate how beautiful and more appropriate this type of chant is for the sacred liturgy. I wish that more churches would give it a try – just jump right in and start with a psalm or entrance antiphon.
RedCat's Mom
I used all three last night at 5 and will do so again at 10 this morning. Will you be posting these every week?
Re: "Will you be posting these every week?"
Perhaps. A group of people are taking up the task and will be experimenting with various simple settings like this. I'll try to post a few different settings by the middle of the week. Please be sure to offer your feedback on how they work for you!
I don't understand why you are going to all of this trouble instead of merely singing the propers in latin? It seems as though you are trying to reinvent the wheel with this? We already have the propers in latin. Please explain this to me.
Anon, no Catholic musician is a lone actor writing his own script. There are many stages between the real-world as it exists today and the solution you suggest, which is of course the ideal. The attitude that we must have all or nothing is precisely why most parishes experience nothing close to the sacred music ideal.
Anon,
As the Cafe's 'real-world' correspondent, I can assure you that "all of this trouble" is well worth Adam, et als' effort.
I've been at this 40+ years.
This last Tuesday I literally combined Adam's Proper settings for All Souls with the Latin requiem chants for an impromptu, "irregular" congregation of about 200 faithful of all stripes demographic. We were not at the parish church, but the cemetery. I could here them a-plenty singing the Introit with ease and with reverence in English. When I canted the psalm from the "ambo" I could hear them singing Arlene Oost Zinner's chant refrain with its perfect, albeit atypical scalic cadence fully.
The difference that you don't recognize, at this time, is that one shouldn't expect any congregation to have any inclination whatsoever to enjoin Latin texts besides those of the Ordinary, because they, whom Pius X envisioned joining the angels and saints, don't have the intellectual resources, YET, to "merely sing the propers in Latin."
We owe so much to Adam, to Bruce and Paul Ford, to Frs. Weber and Kelly, to Palmer-Burgess and many others that we are moving now in yards, not inches back to the Latin chant that is to be esteemed and sung universally.
In the interim, in my parish that I've served for 17 years and counting, I could die happy if what was accomplished last Tuesday would be allowed to happen, to be normative, at one of our nine weekend Masses.
It's not my call. Would that it were.
In the meantime, I'll keep demonstrating the worthiness of Adam's, nay everyone's, efforts to restore the medium of chant as the sublime gift we can offer back to our Creator.
That's why.